This is due not only to the extensive compromise of the protective barrier against microbial invasion, but also as a result of growing pathogen resistance to therapeutic options. Innovative therapies are urgently needed that overcome mechanisms of pathogen resistance – not only for thermal injuries but in general – and are easily administered without concerning systemic side effects (read more: "Nanotechnology solutions to combat superbugs"). "Antimicrobial resistance continues to be a growing crisis, highlighted by the FDA's Generating Antibiotic Incentives Now (GAIN) program, through which three new antibiotics with the indication for acute bacterial skin and skin structure infections were rapidly approved in unprecedented succession. All three however are systemically administered, and we have yet to see new topical antimicrobials emerge," Dr Adam Friedman, Assistant Professor of Dermatology and Director of Dermatologic research at the Montefiore-Albert Einstein College of Medicine, tells Nanowerk. "For me, this gap fuels innovation, serving as the inspiration for my research with broad-spectrum, multi-mechanistic antimicrobial nanomaterials."